A Holistic Approach in Designing Tabletop Robot’s Expressivity

Defining a robot's expressivity is a difficult task that requires thoughtful consideration of the potential of various robot modalities and a model of communication that humans understand. Humanoid and zoomorphic-designed robots can easily take cues from human and animals, respectively when designing their expressivity. However, a robot design that is neither human nor animal-like does not have a clear model to follow in terms of designing expressivity. Animation presents a potential model in these circumstances as animated characters in movies take various forms, sizes, shapes and styles, and are successful in defining expressivity that is widely accepted across different languages and cultures. In this paper, we discuss the development and design of the expressivity of Haru, a table top robot that is neither human nor animal-like and the application of animation expertise to the holistic treatment of the different modalities. The method maximizes animation techniques and expertise normally applied to movies to generate expressivity that is then transferred to the robot hardware. Experimental results show that the robot's expressivity generated using our method is easily understood and are preferred to the conventional approach of generating expressions.